The councils to watch ahead of election defined by Liberal bungles

Council candidates step into an unfamiliar election environment, with Liberal hopefuls swept away and the party left at risk of civil war.

Northern Beaches deputy mayor Georgia Ryburn was preselected as the Liberal Party candidate for the Pittwater by-election on October 19.

Internal Liberal Party tensions threaten to overshadow the NSW local elections, with the botched nominations and factional battles highlighting the party’s struggle to bring in more women.

On Friday, former Victorian treasurer Alan Stockdale, former Victorian senator Richard Alston and former NSW MP Peta Seaton were announced as the joint chairs of the federal committee overseeing the NSW branch in the wake of its failure to preselect 140 local election hopefuls across 16 councils.

It was a move that had Peter Dutton overruling NSW Opposition leader Mark Speakman, who previously wrote to federal executive president John Olsen requesting the committee be widened to include four chairs.

Mr Speakman had hoped former MP Fiona Scott would be the final addition to balance the committee’s gender input and factional leaning.

Looking to make peace across his party, former Prime Minister John Howard praised the Opposition Leader and Mr Olsen for stepping in.

“I strongly support the decision today of the federal executive of the Liberal Party to intervene in the affairs of the NSW division of the party,” Mr Howard said in a statement.

“The executive has appointed a high quality three person committee of management to administer the affairs of the NSW division.

As a life member of the NSW division, I care deeply about its place in the national affairs of the Liberal Party.”

While Ms Seaton was inducted to the committee, Ms Scott was left off, providing Mr Stockdale and Mr Alston’s Liberal right faction the opportunity to reign over the historically moderate branch.

Mr Speakman brought the party friction into the public arena on Friday, releasing a statement which called for the prioritisation of gender parity in the party.

NSW Liberal Party leader Mark Speakman is vying to keep his party in the hands of party moderates. Picture: Max Mason-Hubers / NewsWire

“Here in NSW I’ll always fight for equal opportunities for talented women to be appointed on merit and to have seats at the table. If we win the upcoming state by-elections, the NSW parliamentary Liberal Party will be at gender parity for the first time,” Mr Speakman said.

The latest Liberal addition to the blue ribbon triple state by-election is Pittwater candidate Georgia Ryburn, who will endeavour on October 19 to maintain the slim margin the party has over teal independent Jacqui Scruby.

The by-election comes after NSW MP Rory Amon’s resignation in lieu of alleged child sex offences.

Across the state on Saturday voters will decide the composition of local wards and councils.

In the Northern Beaches Council, where Ms Ryburn previously served as deputy mayor before the preselection failure left her ousted, the Liberal exodus is tipped to widen the margins for major parties and the dominating Your Northern Beaches independent group.

Top of mind across LGAs are the issues of housing targets and affordability, maintaining heritage, rate rises and local services.

In Liverpool, voters will decide the fate of controversial lord mayor Ned Mannoun after discussion of a delayed election to allow the full outcome of a pending ICAC investigation into the council to be put to rest.

Alleged maladministration in the area has vexed NSW Local Government Minister Ron Hoenig, who published new transparency and conduct guidelines for councils ahead of the local elections.

Blacktown voters will be deciding if Mayor Brad Bunting stays on, after recently taking up the role in the wake of popular mayor Tony Bleasdale’s sudden and unexpected death earlier this year.

In the Inner West, Labor mayor Darcy Byrne will hold off a widening Greens vote and independent candidates still frustrated with the 2016 merging of the former Ashfield, Leichhardt and Marrickville councils.

A fledgling group of Liberal candidates who avoided the preselection wipe-out offer the only cohesive right-wing body across the LGA, but have expressed very few policy positions in the election lead-up.

Canterbury-Bankstown offers a similar conundrum, where Labor Mayor Bilal El-Hayek will enjoy less competition from a partially cut Liberal faction, but is under threat by independents targeting the party on its diversion of funds for road maintenance and associated services into the area’s Lakemba Night Market event.

In the City of Sydney, an election that draws attention from those outside the region as much as its own residents, long-serving Lord Mayor Clover Moore is almost certain to secure a sixth term, with nine other mayoral candidates across the major parties and independent spectrum will scrabble to at least unseat Team Clover from its majority rule.